Scotland suffered a heavy defeat against South Africa in their final pool outing at the World Rugby U20 Championship in Italy. Image: World Rugby 
SCOTLAND suffered their third reverse in Pool A of the World U20 Championship in the third and final round of the group stage at Stadio San Michele in Calvisano. It was a crushing defeat to a South Africa side that had power and pace in spades, and which was unrelenting in its quest to stack up a huge scoreline.
If there was any consolation for the Scots it lay in the fact that Australia were beaten by exactly the same number of points in their opening Pool A match ten days ago, albeit the young Wallabies managed to score one more try than Scotland. The other part of the game from which the Scots can draw some pride was the third quarter, when, after conceding seven tries before the break, Scotland shored up their defence to stop South Africa adding to their account in this period.
But whatever straws are clutched at, the reality is that Scotland were simply in a different league from the Junior Boks against whom they have perennially suffered at this level, not least in the the first U20 World Championship in 2008 when Richie Gray sustained a broken jaw and the rest of his team broken morale.
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Specifically, the young Scots seemed overwhelmed by the sprinting abilities of the South Africa backs who used their immense pace not just in attacking play but to cut down any space afforded to the Scotland players on the few occasions when they moved the ball. And all too often the Scots were guilty of not engaging quickly enough in defence allowing the Junior Boks the time and space to utilise their skills. Moreover, South Africa possessed a pack that was … well South African. Which is to say very efficient at the set-piece and deadly at maul time.
Amid the carnage of the battlefield there were a number of individuals who posted reasonable performances, among them No 8 Reuben Logan, who looked powerful with ball in hand, Seb Stephen, who confirmed the progress he has shown with Glasgow Warriors, and flanker Oliver Duncan, who pulled off a number of important tackles.
Behind the scrum, Hector Patterson tried to initiate some go-forward into the Scots play while at centre Jack Hocking showed incisive running at times.
Scotland, who had to make a late change at stand-off with Matthew Urwin replacing the unwell Isaac Coates, showed promise in the opening few minutes of the game with clever handling, but it quickly turned into a horror show after Urwin elected to cross-kick to Logan. In the event the ball was taken in the air by Jaco Williams, allowing the pacy left wing to sprint from his own 22 for the opening try, converted successfully by stand-off Vusi Moyo.
It was merely the start for the Junior Boks who quickly added a second try from a line-out maul scored by skipper Thando Biyela, this time Moyo’s conversion skewing wide of the posts.
Then, when centre Dominic Malgas finished off an initial break by scrum-half Sean Everson to which Moyo added the extra points, South Africa were ahead by 19-0 with just 12 minutes played.
The bonus point try quickly followed in the form of a second touchdown for Williams converted by Moyo to give South Africa a 26-0 lead with a 1.5 points per minute scoring rate, the try torrent continuing with a second score from a driven line-out, credited to prop Oliver Reed.
The coterie of Scotland supporters in the stand were in need of an uplifting score from their team, and their prayers were answered with a try by Stephen from an initial incision by Hocking and a powerful carry by Logan, whose accurate offload gave the Scotland hooker a touchdown close to the posts, carefully converted by Urwin.
But no sooner had the Scots celebrated their first score than South Africa struck yet again, their pace and mesmerising footwork producing a try for full back Gilberto Mentoe converted by replacement Ian van Der Merwe.
A close range score from front-row Jean Erasmus kept the points piling up even more and preceded a further set-back for Scotland when a yellow-card was shown to Charlie Moss for head contact in the tackle to conclude a morale-damaging first half with the 45-7 scoreline making unpalatable reading.
South Africa missed four chances to increase their points tally during the opening minutes of the second half providing a boost for the Scotland defence which maintained it resistance up to the hour mark.
But when livewire Ceano Everson raced in for a scintillating try on the hour mark it was the signal for the Junior Boks to resume their points quest, confirmed when a clever piece of running from deep produced yet another try, this time a run-in by Stephanus Linde, both tries converted by Van Der Merwe.
The flow of points in the final quarter was incessant, as Malgas showed his pace before passing to the supporting Everson for the scrum-half to claim his second try of the match, the conversion again kicked by Van Der Merwe.
Then another moment for Scotland with replacement Oliver Finlayson-Russell crashing over from closerange after a strong build-up, Jack Brown taking over kicking duties, succeeding with the conversion attempt.
But in the final couple of minutes of the game, the Junior Boks put on another display of sheer pace and handling skills, running the ball from their own 22m area and finishing with a try by replacement Haashim Pead and the conversion by Van de Merwe to round off a stellar and breath-taking performance.
Teams –
South Africa: G Mentoe (H Pead 71); C Jooste, G Cupido, D Malgas, J Williams; V Moyo (I Ven der Merwe 25), C Everson (H Pead ); O Reid (P Kubheka 49), J Schoeman, J Erasmus (H Lubbe 58), J Grobbelaar (JJ Theron 62), M Venter, T Biyela ©, M Romao (B Hlekani 56), S Linde
Scotland: J Brown; N Moncrieff (J Findlay 69), A Hunter, J Hocking, C van Wyk; M Urwin (K Yule 65), H Patterson (N Cowan 55); J Shearer (W Pearce 55), S Stephen, J Stewart (O Blyth-Lafferty 55), M Fyffe (B Godsell 65), C Moss, O Duncan, F Douglas (J Roberts 58 (O Finlayson-Russell 62), R Logan.
Referee: Ben Breakspear (Wales)
Scorers –
South Africa: Tries: Williams 2, Biyela, Malgas, Reid, Mentoe, Erasmus, Everson 2, Linde, Pead; Cons :Moyo 4, Van de Merwe 5.
Scotland: Tries: Stephen, Finlayson-Russsell; Cons: Urwin, Brown
Scoring Sequence (South Africa first: 5-0; 7-0; 12-0; 17-0; 19-0; 24-0; 26-0; 31-0; 33-0; 33-5; 33-7; 38-7; 40-7; 45-7 (h-t) 50-7; 52-7; 57-7; 59-7; 64-7; 66-7; 66-12; 66-14; 71-14; 73-14.
Yellow cards –
Scotland: Charlie Moss (39 mins)
Man-of-the-Match: In a glittering array of South Africa talent, it is perhaps invidious to single out any one player. That said, aside from scoring a brace of tries, scrum-half Ceano Everson was the catalyst of many of his side’s scores and is the deserved MOTM
Talking point: Scotland will need to recover well from what must have been a dispiriting defeat to South Africa before playing their fourth round match in the 9-12 seedings on Monday at the Payanini Center, Verona. Scotland, not unexpectedly after being drawn in the ‘group of death’, are the 12th seeds at the conclusion of the pool matches but perhaps as they showed in the Trophy competition a year ago they will be a different side when facing opposition of a standard more akin to themselves.
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